


I Cast a Spell Over the West (to Make You Think of Me)

by brieflybe



Category: Carry On Series - Rainbow Rowell, Simon Snow & Related Fandoms
Genre: A really long flight, Angst, Anxiety, Depression, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Relationship Problems, Trauma, Vampires, coda to wayward son, wayward son spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-21
Updated: 2019-12-27
Packaged: 2021-02-26 02:22:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 11,094
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21885904
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/brieflybe/pseuds/brieflybe
Summary: The flight back is an awkward affair. Things are said; and shouted; and shuttered. At least Simon has brought some booze for the road.~Contains spoilers to Wayward Son.
Relationships: Tyrannus Basilton "Baz" Pitch/Simon Snow
Comments: 9
Kudos: 84





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> The title of the fic is from the song "Bang the Doldrums" by Fall Out Boy.  
> The song at the beginning and end is "Old Yellow Bricks" by Arctic Monkeys.  
> Honestly, I just wanted to write this argument between Simon ans Baz. It escalated quickly.

_Old yellow bricks  
_ _Love's a risk  
_ _Quite the little 'escapologist'  
_ _Looked so miffed  
_ _When you wished  
_ _For a thousand places better than this_

 _You are the fugitive  
_ _But you don't know what you're runnin' from  
_ _You can't kid us  
_ _And you couldn't trick anyone  
_ _Houdini, love you don't know what you're runnin' away from_

  
  


It’s not exactly a surprise. The troubles, that is. Watford is a troubled school. It was a troubled school even before Simon, and it will continue to be troubled in his absence. Simon excelled at saving Watford almost as much as he excelled at saving Agatha, though Agatha-Rescue-Missions tended to have fewer casualties. Simon had loved both of them. He’d loved Watford more. He loves Watford still. He really had meant to leave, this time around. Perhaps he’s still going to. He’s probably still going to. He can’t even get inside, by himself (there is a line, in Peter Pan, about how you lose the ability to fly as soon as you start to doubt it. Simon was always doubtful. Simon was always meant to lose). 

Here is how Baz responds. Baz tears his gaze away from Simon like it’s painful. Baz turns to Penny, baring his teeth, like she was the one to break his heart. Baz opens his mouth to ask the right questions, the wrong way. “Oh for Crowly’s sake, what is it this time?” he raises his hands upwards, as if in despair. “I mean, Snow is not even _there_.” His eyes turn back to Simon, then, as if to verify. 

Here is how Simon responds. He turns his gaze away from Baz. He gets up, patting the back of his jeans in a futile attempt to get rid of all the sand. “Okay,” he says. “Let’s go.” And so he goes. He does not ask any questions. He does not ask what happened. He does not ask if there is anything that can be done. Whether they’re hurrying back to save the place, or to sit next to its deathbed, to say goodbye. Everything is destructible, Simon has learned. Even magic. In America, there would be no school to find the orphan clueless wizard and show him the world of the Mages. In America, Simon would have no acquired home to lose. But Simon is a Brit, and Watford had found him. And here they are. 

Baz curses behind Simon. Baz gets up and follows him, as he promised. As he said would make him happy. Baz loves Watford too. 

“Oh will you come off it and just tell us what the fuck happened?” he calls after them. 

“In the car,” Penny replies. 

Simon knows this. You start moving, then you ask questions. When the Mage says jump, you ask how high. When Penny says jump - you jump, and hopes not to disappoint her (when Baz says jump, you stumble and fall on your face. It’s not your fault - your tail got in the way). Simon soldiers on. 

He allows Penny to magic his wings away. It’s a tight fit in a car, with the five of them, and everyone looks slightly claustrophobic as it is. They should not have come to America. Agatha would be dead, had they not come to America. They should not have come to America and be themselves. Simon is a spectacle, Baz has always said, or he makes one of himself, at least. And Baz is a vampire. There was no balance to be found on those long stretches of road, just magickal wildlife, and maybe Simon should have just let that dragon take him. Maybe appearance is everything. Maybe that would have been for the best. 

Would Baz have let him go? Would he have followed him? What does it mean, the stuff he said, on the beach. About whatever it is he’s going to do. About his plans. 

This is what Simon thinks about, pressed between his boyfriend and his ex in another stolen vehicle, when Penny informs him that once again, he’s destroyed the world of Mages. They should not have come to America. Agatha would be dead, had they not come to America. They should not have come to America and be themselves. There is nothing, he supposes, to be done about this now. 

“I guess I just didn’t really believe…” he trails off. What can he say? That he didn’t think their actions could have unfortunate consequences? Simon has destroyed the world of mages bit by bit, every time he went off, for years and years and years. Every breath he took, back then, had unfortunate consequences. He runs his hand through his hair. Baz is staring at him intently. Like he’s waiting for him to speak. Like maybe he approves of Simon’s haircut. 

“That’s ‘cause you’re an idiot who was raised by the mage to believe your own self-righteousness will protect you from all harm,” Baz snaps. He must be rattled, if he mentions the Mage. Nobody ever brings up the Mage. “Of course we caused troubles,” he asserts, raising his hand to clutch at his hair. “Of course.” In Simon’s mind, he reaches out. He removed Baz’s fingers from where they’re digging into his scalp, and he - keeps them. Wraps them with his own palm. In reality - 

They’ve fucked it all up. They went viral, more like. And while usually, people would have called bullshit, would have blamed smoke and mirrors and CGI, America is in fucking chaos. People want to participate in the debate. People want to participate in an honest to Crowley Witch hunt. People want to be in the media. People do not have a Magickal Community to follow. They follow their own community. Their own community is bloody mad. So yes, Watford is in trouble. Most mages are. Except that Watford is a place. It’s a Mage territory. It’s a thing to storm into with torches and pitchforks if you’re scared. A thing that can be found by Magickal creatures that were kept out. And people are scared. And the creatures are mad. 

Simon takes a deep breath. It’s not like they’ve ruined everything. Just enough to cause trouble. To raise questions. To raise some sort of war. Simon takes another deep breath. People are scared shitless. 

Responsibility was already taken for the videos, by some made-up entertainment group, claiming reality TV and a social experiment. But it’s a thing now, isn’t it? A thing to have conspiracy theories about. A thing to rose Shepherds to talk outside of their chat groups. It’s a weak spot, and an opportunity, and so there is an unorganized army of magickal creatures outside of Watford, demanding to negotiate, and here they are. 

The Mage said this day would come - is all that Simon can think, all of a sudden, somewhat hysterically. 

He didn’t mean to do this, though. He didn’t mean to destroy the world of mages a second time. He really didn’t. 

“Stop it,” Baz snaps at him. “You’re shaking. It’s driving me insane.” 

“Excuse me?” he snaps right back. He misses Watford sometimes. Like you miss a lover who cheated on you. Like missing a lover you once cheated on. Something forbidden, who’s light is sullied by the knowledge the world isn’t what you once believed it to be. “Is my shock and dread regarding our impending doom driving you insane?” he grits out. He sounds like Baz, or perhaps Agatha. It makes sense, he doesn’t feel like himself. He misses the ability to boil over. To Hulk Out. To go off. There is so much pent up energy inside of him right now, it makes the irony of him being devoid of magick all the more laughable. 

Baz snorts, “Careful, they won’t let you pass customs with all this new-found sarcasm.”

“Will they let you pass? At all?” asks Shepard. Simon is startled. He seems to forget about Shepard’s presence every time he’s out of sight. It’s fine, he figures. Penny is paying enough attention for both of them, what with being convinced that he was plotting against them and all. He remembers when he was convinced that an attractive boy was plotting - he couldn’t ever look away. He still can’t look away. “I mean,” Shepard continues - “since you’re clearly seen in the video. And apparently, things are… tense. Right now. Won’t we be stopped at the border?”

Simon shakes his head. He can’t think about this. “I guess… I guess we should all disguise ourselves?”

Baz draws a sharp breath. “Well, what’s a little identity fraud between grand-larceners,” he offers. “I can’t believe I might be a wanted man because of vampires and it’s not even me who’s the vampire at fault,” he mutters. 

“Me neither,” Simon, Penny, and Agatha reply simultaneously. 

Shepard just blinks at them. 

“Sod off,” he snaps, before grabbing at Simon’s arm, raising his wand to cast “don’t judge a book by its cover.” Simon, on his part, is judging them. He’s disgusted by magic sometimes, when it touches his skin. He can’t help it. And he - he wishes that someone will rise up and shout “I don’t believe in the chosen one” so that he, like a fairy, could drop dead. But no one ever does.

They make it to the Duty-Free unnoticed, surrounded by “nothing to see here”’s, “This isn’t what it looks like”’s, and “Meet the new me”’s. At this point, he’s pretty sure that they’re, in essence, a dead-spot - a field of confusion and emptiness, a scratch on the surface of time and space. He’d feel ashamed, except that the fear of being seen, at this point, is far greater.

“We have an hour until our flight,” Penny sighs. Agatha, on her part, is already making her way to the nearest shop, Burberry, or something like that. She appears relatively calm, for someone that was chased and caught by everything she intended to walk away from. He feels guilty, in a way. Simon did not realize that near-death experience may cause trauma at the time. He did not consider that being near him left a toll. Really, the Humdrum should have kidnaped Baz. Simon would have burned the entire world, and everything would’ve been over much sooner.

He sighs. He remembers almost dying in blurry colors and sharp pain that tears through organs and time and space (as if Simon can step right back into this moment every day, every time). He shakes himself, physically, earning a worried look from Baz. Baz, who seems just ready to step back into that very same moment. It’s funny, how they spend so much time living the same nightmares. They never meet. 

“All right, Snow?” Baz asks. 

Simon is biting his lower lip. Baz is watching Simon biting his lower lip. “I want to get drunk,” he says all of the sudden. He doesn’t, really. He doesn’t know where that came from. But it was something to say, and then something to do, and then something to be, so there you go. 

Baz raises two delicate eyebrows. “Right here?”

Simon shrugs. “On the plane. We can get the booze here, though.” He gestures toward a shiny, white, Duty-Free stores where perfumes, make-up, chocolates and alcohol lived together in perfect harmony. “C’mon,” he says, “we can buy something that you’ll like, something fancy.” He barely thought about it during the trip, but he wants - something, all of a sudden. A pint of Aspall. His head is swimming, unmodulated, overloaded. There is an ache in his throat. 

Baz’s eyebrows remain floating near his forehead. “I don’t like drinking.”

Simon can feel himself frowns. “You drunk at that party.” He insists. The truth is, he doesn’t care if he makes Baz uncomfortable. The truth is, he’s hungry. The truth is, he wants something sacrificed at his altar. The truth is, he’s a terrible boyfriend. 

“I was keeping my cover, as you’re well aware.” Baz drawls. “Is it wise, do you think, to drink before one is stepping into battle?”

Simon does not see his point. As of late, Simon has been missing most points. “Is it wise, do you think, to drink while keeping a cover?” 

“You know, I might need a drink just to deal with you,” Baz shoots back. 

Simon’s smile is sunny. “Fantastic, let’s go then.” He replies, making his way towards the store. In the distance, he can see Vodka. In the distance, there is hope. 

Baz vetos the Vodka, of course, but that’s fine. Simon did not really expect to succeed as much as he did. Instead, they end up with two bottles of Sauvignon Blanc and one bottle of Bellini, because Baz has wanted to try Bellini. 

Penny stares at them as they make their way back. “Oh, is it your bachelorette party? You never said.” 

Shepard snickers. “Hey, as long as they share.” 

“Is it really a good idea -” Penny starts.

“It is,” Agatha stops her. 

And so it goes. 

  
  


“No, no, stop talking,” Penny commands Shepard. Her hostility towards him has returned with a new intensity, which was only amplified by the fact the Agatha doesn’t seem to mind him (and no man has ever minded Agatha). “You don’t get it. Everything is ruined because of people like _you_ and you just don’t get it.” So that might not have been Simon’s best idea. The Booze, that is.

They are unevenly matched, the lot of them, by exhaustion, lowered inhibitions, and nerve. So while Baz reacts to the crumbling of the world as they know it like he’s a block of ice, his thigh is firmly pressed against Simon’s, even as his sit is folded all the way back. Penny reacts with fire, an uncontained explosion driven by rage and confusion and fear. It’s all very out of place, amidst the pleasant buzz Simon is currently working to maintain (too much, too quickly, and he becomes something else, almost. This weird, stumbling marionette that can’t work its own limbs properly, that gets his wings cut on the window frame, that gets the window frame cut on his tail. He can’t remember why he moves, but he can’t stop moving. He can’t remember why he loves anything, but he can’t stop hurting, either).

The block of ice speaks. “You know that the NowNext and other groups of unhappy creatures are just as much to blame, Bunce. Normals can’t actually attack Watford.” He drawls. “I would also like to remind you that while the current attacks are clearly sporadic and partisan, hostile behavior from the daughter of the school’s principal is a sure way to turn them into government policy.” 

His fingers are moving about, inching between Simon’s palm and the space around them. He used to do that, before Simon’s pulled back. Throwing out insults to the world while Simon’s head is placed in his lap. Sending a cutting remark while running his hand through Simon’s hair. Simon could never be sure whether he was safe because of his identity or due to sheer proximity, but Baz’s fingers never stopped being soft against his skin, and Simon’d found it amusing until he found it grating. Until everything said and done around him itched, and scratched, and was taken personally. Baz used to be so mean to Simon. Baz is still so mean. 

“Baz,” he says, because Simon used to protect people from Baz, that was what he was known for, but then the words die in his throat. It is her fault - Penny. It’s all of their faults, really, even Agatha (and things was never, as a rule. Agatha’s fault) and Simon is a big believer in placing blame where it belongs. They should not have gone to America. Though otherwise, Agatha would be dead, or a lab rat. Though otherwise who knows what NowNext would have done, though otherwise, he would have gotten to finish that sentence, and even though he still might (“Baz, when someone shows you their true self…” It’s actually a spell, used to remove make-up and get people naked. Simon doesn’t have the magic for that, nor is he getting Baz naked any time soon, probably) it hurts to think about. Everything hurts to think about. There are only two lists in his head these days: before, and after, and then there’s white noise, and Simon running around, sitting around, lying around, wishing he had a sedative. 

Baz is looking at him. Simon forgot he’d spoken. Baz’s fingers touch his, and Simon flinches away, because that’s what he does, because Baz’s skin is so cold, and Simon’s insides are all twisted, like everything might kill him. It’s a well-rehearsed dance - Simon flinches away, and then Baz does too. Simon is hurt, and then he hurts Baz, too. He sighs. He runs his fingers through his hair. “Do you like my new haircut?” He asks. 

Baz’s gaze is sharp. He raises his hand, as if meaning to touch Simon’s curls, then thinking better of it. He looks at Simon with that way he has, like he’s composing sonnets about him in his mind, even though Simon’s socks both have holes in them. “You’re fucking beautiful Simon,” is his response. He sounds upset. “Fuck you and your haircut.” 

Simon smiles at him, just a little. Baz seems to have lost some filter that’s still firmly jammed down Simon’s throat. Simon supposes that it’s the falling to the ground dead thing, but who can say, really. It scares Simon. He’s scared Baz is going to tell him that he loves him. This is not a time in which Simon is able to hear about love. To exchange love. He knows that Baz can cast _On love’s light wings_ , and Simon will never be able to, and it doesn’t matter how much he loves Baz. His love does not amount to words, or actions, or magic. It’s stuck uselessly in his chest, drowned by cider. 

He reaches out and clasps Baz’s hand in his, pulling both their palms to rest in his lap. 

Baz’s eyebrows are raised. 

Simon shrugs. 

Baz scowls. 

Simon shrugs, playing with Baz’s fingers.

Baz softens. 

It’s the circle of life. 

  
  


They board the plain slowly, feeling very much like criminals (the feeling is well-placed). Simon makes his way towards their sits, 10A-10E and places himself near the window. He likes watching the clouds. He likes flying. He likes knowing that for that, he’s dependant on nothing and no one. He should bid goodbye to that, probably. Baz sits beside him, in the middle seat, though the idea seems to pain him. 

“If you wish to feel nostalgic I can seat Agatha in the middle?” Penny suggests innocently, because Penny is pissed off, and Penny is a kind person, but she’s mean, in her own way, and apparently those are Simon’s people.

“Piss off, Bunce.” Baz asserts, before sending a long, designer shirt clad arm to cover their arm-rest. 

Shepard’s eyebrows rise with interest. Like he’s going to write about Simon’s love life in one of his Forums. “Two Mages & a Vampire: The Love Triangle of a Life-time; The ending may surprise you!” Simon thinks that might be a bit funny, in a Baz’like sort of way, but he can’t tell Baz about it now, so he just glares, instead. 

Agatha snorts (but in an elegant way). “Please, If anything Simon should be the one in the middle.” She corrects, her voice sharp. “Or else Baz’ll climb all over me to get to my ex-boyfriend, won’t he?” She tilts her head to the side, platinum hair falling into her eyes. 

“You’re meaner since we broke up,” Simon tells her, because Baz is scowling, and whatever it is he’ll have to say when he stops, it can’t be good. 

“Well your boyfriend’s family invented mean in the 1600s, so you must be used to it by now,” Agatha tells him. “Spare me.” 

Simon doesn’t know what to say to either of him. 

“That’s enough,” Penny snaps. “You’re being childish.” 

Simon sends his arm to rest next to Baz’s, and he seems to relax, in every part of him that Simon is touching. His face is still murderous. Simon wonders, sometimes, whether he has these powers, and what he can do with them. But then he has to stop.

“Not to meddle,” Shepard starts -

“He said, meddling -” 

“But you -” he gestures toward Penny, “seem to have started it,” he finishes it. 

The whole three of them - Agatha, Baz, and Simon - are smiling at him. 

“Please Shepard,” Baz says. “Sit over here. Leave the ladies -” he drawls, “to have some girl-talk.”

Simon can’t help it. He giggles. 

“Jump out an airplane, Baz,” Penny tells him. 

“I can fly,” Simon answers. “I’ll save him.”

So Baz leans into him, a little. With his arm. With his shoulder. Simon gets him, all of a sudden. Simon feels himself relax, too.

Here is a list of things Simon is thinking about: That he’s scared his wings will return while they’re onboard the plane; That he wishes they would serve food already; That he can’t actually save Baz, if he jumps off the plane, because he has no wings at the moment, he has no tail; That if something happens to Baz - right now, ever - Simon will go off and his lack of magic will not stand in his way; That Baz once said that all he wants is to know what Simon is thinking, but if Simon had the ability to know what Baz is thinking he will run out of the room, he will jump off the stupid plane. That the inflight movie is Call Me By Your Name and Baz had wanted to see that in theatre, but Simon wouldn’t go. He’s thinking about being forced to stay with that dragon, and never seeing Baz again, about what she said to him, about his magic - 

He’s thinking he’s feeling a bit ill. 

At the moment, Shepard and Simon are passing a bottle of wine between them, ignoring the weary eyes of both Baz and the flight attendants. 

“Wasn’t much of a vacation,” Baz says softly.

“No,” agrees Simon, “it wasn’t. It was more like -” he starts, because he’s half-way to totally drunk, just like he wanted, and is therefore mellowed out both by the booze as well as the knowledge that something, at least, went as planned. “When the Mage would take me on trips, you know? And we’d end up killing Goblins.” 

Baz snorts. “Happened a lot, did it?”

Simon nods. He’s riding - not a high, exactly. A Roller Coaster, maybe. A car he’s not legally allowed to drive, on the wrong side of the road. “Then I’d come back covered in blood and you - agh.” He hesitates. 

“I would leave the room,” Baz finishes for him, his voice sharp. “You’re welcome, Snow.” 

Simon shakes his head. “Or you wouldn’t be in at all, and I’d know that you were hunting - or, plotting? Or whatever. Did you plot? Really? I’m sure you did.” He turns to look at Baz, who seems - at a loss, but not entirely in a bad way. “Drove me insane, you know.” He’s smiling, just a little. “I could never fall asleep until you came back, and Penny would say that it’s mental that you were the first person I went to look for after a long journey, like, before I’d even see Agatha? Anyway. This vacation was something like that.” He shrugs. He has the feeling that he said too much, but he can’t quite put a finger on it. 

Baz is - openly staring, eyes wide, mouth slightly open, hair messy from… this entire day, probably. When he speaks, eventually, it seems to cost him something. “Of course I was plotting, you numpty. I’m always plotting. I’m plotting at this very moment.” 

Simon is smiling, still - at Baz. 

“Okay, what the fuck? What is even this school?” Shepard says. 

“Hogwarts,” Baz snaps at him. Then he leans forward, towards Simon, he’s looking at him, and he reaches with both hands and Simon thinks, for a moment, that Baz is going to touch him, that he might let him, this time around, maybe he will, alcohol has made him lighter here, somehow, unlike at home, where it simply builds walls around him, makes him burrow inside his own mind and flinch at sudden movements and flinch at loud noises - but then Baz preys the bottle from between his fingers. He takes a few long gulps, then wipes at his mouth, and returns the bottle to Simon. “Well, if you’re going to dredge up our sordid past in front of a complete stranger -” he says, as a way of explaining. 

“I wish you would have liked me back then,” he finds himself saying, like an idiot. He didn’t realize it was something he thought about, is the thing. He didn’t realize he was feeling this way. He wants to stop, now that he has. 

Baz makes a small noise of outrage, but Simon soldiers on.

“Like,” he continues, “That you were willing to be my friend?” he’s looking meaningfully at Baz. Baz looks at him meaningfully too, and the meaning is that he’s planning to murder him in cold blood, just as Simon was convinced he’ll do back at school.

“This feels like a private conversation,” Shepard inserts, suddenly, perhaps since watching Baz being murderous is a relatively personal experience - to Simon, at least. 

“Oh does it,” Baz snaps. “Does it feel like a private conversation, the conversation that I’m having with my boyfriend at the transatlantic trip I’m at with my boyfriend, which you crashed by following us into a quiet zone? Does it feel private?” 

Simon feels - ashamed, and a bit pleased that Baz is showing that much anger, and a bit ashamed, again, that he’s pleased. “I didn’t mean to make it private,” he says, quietly. 

“Oh for Crowley’s sake,” Baz says, then sends his hand forward to grasp at Simon’s arm, before thinking better of it. It’s really something, Baz’s self-control. He has one list in his head, a Simon-like list, of things that he can’t do, and he will obey that list uf it kills him. It’s painful to watch. Simon is pretty sure he’s most of that list. “Come with me, Snow,” he orders.

Simon blinks at him. 

“I am sobering you up, and I can’t do that in front of an entire plane, come with now.”

“I don’t want to -”

“Oh dear, you don’t want to? How shall I ever sleep at night? _Come_.” 

Shepard already stands to allow them to pass, and Penny and Agatha are staring, Agatha mumbling something like: “But they’re together now, why are they still like this?” while Penny shakes her head, apathetic. 

He follows Baz through passages that are to narrow for me in the best of times, grasping at his shoulder to keep himself upright. He leads Simon ahead, until they get to a bathroom stall and he opens it with aggression that he usually saves for Football and people who ask moronic questions in class, and people who ask moronic questions in life, and people who are moronic, and Simon. “Get in,” he orders. 

Simon does. He remembers, vaguely, behind the fog in his brain, that they’re not allowed to talk. That there is a reason that they don’t. That Simon doesn’t deserve understanding and Baz doesn’t deserve Simon, Baz deserves better, and that an airplane is not the right place for any of that. 

Baz follows him in and shuts the door behind them. 


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mostly it was too long to be posted as one chapter and it bothered me so I split it!

There is barely a room for the both of them, and Simon, who’s used to fear that his wings and tail (especially the tail) will spring up and decimate everything in the near vicinity, including friends and a boyfriend and the telly, feels himself shrink. “Baz,” he says, his voice slurred - only somewhat on purpose, “Did you think this through?” 

Baz is ignoring him, perhaps busy taking in their environment - the foggy mirror, the small sink with soup bottle attached, the goddamn toilet, the artificial smell of lemon-scented air freshener. Then Baz sighs, and his shoulders sag as he takes this wand out of the pocket of his jeans.

Simon flinches, sure that Baz is about to cast _“At last the fog has lifted_ ”. He doesn’t want - he can’t help it, the flinching. But Baz simply casts “room for one more,” and Simon flinches again, as the stall expands around them. Then he casts “You can eat off the floor” and “Minty Fresh”. Suddenly their standing in a small, squeaky-clean room that smells like Mentos, and also happen to have a toilet. Simon is both disoriented and relieved. “It’s like we’re in the Tardis,” he offers, when Baz turns to him expectantly. “Bigger on the inside.” 

Baz does not seem impressed by his Doctor Who reference, but what can you do. 

When Baz’s first done this to a room Simon was in, Simon has laughed, and took his hand, and called him Loki. He doesn’t do that anymore. He stares instead. He imagines the room as it was. He thinks about how everything can be stripped away from everything. About what’s left of you, once that is done. 

Then Baz casts “ _somewhere over the rainbow_ ” and the air around them changes, fills with static. They’re somewhere else now. Not really, they’re still in a bathroom stall on an airplane, it’s more like the airplane doesn’t have them anymore, not really. Like How normals can’t access Watford. Like how you can never really be sure in the passage of time, when you walk into a magical forest. Surely that’s a ridiculous waste of magic. Surely whatever plans Baz has for him, that’s way excessive. 

“I feel dizzy,” Simon says, because he does, and he’s not sure how to stop. He raises his hand, however, when Baz raises his wand, even though his hand is not a shield, and Baz can crush him like a bug, and Simon is not afraid of being crashed, exactly, in the sense - in the sense that it would make sense if it does happen, and he wouldn’t actually care all that much, but he always recoils. Always. 

Baz shakes his head. “I knew this was a bad idea,” he mutters. Simon dislikes blanket statements, is the things. I knew this was a mistake, uttered in a room in which the Chosen One resides. And Baz doesn’t mean it like that, and Simon knows this, but Simon is such a big joke, is the thing. And so every time someone laughs, it’s like their laughing at him. And Baz had made a joke out of him in the past, and Simon was scared, and Simon had cried - 

“No,” Simon mutters right back. “No, it was a good idea,” he says, somewhat desperately, with a gravity that does not much the situation. “You just didn’t. Um. Partake in it.”

Baz raises one dark eyebrow. “I’ll just sober you up, and then we can go back,” he says, voice soothing. Baz doesn’t really have a soothing voice. He has a voice that’s sharp, and a voice that’s soft, and they both sound like an earthquake. “How are your wings - do they need touching up?” 

“No.” he blurts out. “No, don’t do that -” he raises his hand, pushing forward until he’s touching Baz’s chest. Baz lets out a sharp intake of breath, because Baz is one dramatic vampire. He gasps. He smirks. He swoons. He thinks that no one can see him do any of those things, but Simon can feel it. He’d close his eyes, every time that Simon touched him, like he couldn’t get used to it. “I just meant -” he swallows. “I didn’t mean to imply -” what didn’t he mean? Imply is such a Baz word. He’s been using Baz Words for a while now. “I just wish you’d like me?” he says, like a question. That’s pathetic. He’s taking it back. “I mean -” he stammers. “That you were at my side.” 

There are right questions and wrong questions. Wrong questions: How long have you loved me? Do you regret that? Did you take Philipa’s voice away? Was that meant for me? What would you have done, in a world without my voice? You love my voice, don’t you? What do you want from me? What do you want me to do? Are you going to live forever? Are you going to live forever without me? When the Dragon said I gave all the Magick I took back, and more, what did she mean by that? 

Right questions: there are no right questions. There are wrong questions, and stupid questions, but he’d put all of them on the same list. He thinks he’s made of that list. That if he’d still have his magick, he’d cast it as a spell, and nothing would be left of him. 

Baz seems - pained. His eyes are closed, long eyelashes fanning over his cheeks like a statement, his mouth stretched in a thin line. His nose is the way Simon had left it after he broke it. He’s so incredibly pale - he’s practically glowing. This trip has done a number on him, probably. “I was at your side when it counted,” Baz replies, voice neutral. “And I did like you.” 

Simon has done a number on him, probably. He seems to be tearing something out of himself, with that last one. This situation, this conversation, in that stall, with this particular boy - probably isn’t worth the sacrifice. Baz doesn’t understand what Simon means, though, and Simon never explains himself well. Simon is a scared kid, and he’s having tantrums. It is what it is. “I just meant…” he starts. “That it probably would have gone better, had you been there.” Simon waves his hand, nearly hitting Baz right in the face. “All of it.” He swallows, “You would have - understood things, about the Mage. and about me. You’re smart, so you could have -”

Baz stares at him, aghast. “You wished that I was there to _protect_ you?”

“I wish I wasn’t so _dumb_.” So that’s a nice thing to say to the boy you’re dating. Tell him you’re a coward, next. “I wish I didn’t get everything so wrong, and I think that with you there - Crowley, who knows.”

Baz is still staring, his hands folded across his chest, body stretched to full height. This is a fight. Simon gets that. He hopes it’s a fair fight. “What’s the point of thinking any of that?” He doesn’t understand, Simon can’t make him understand, and it’s not Baz’s fault, it isn’t, it’s just that there are not words for whatever it is that Simon _is_. 

“And you could have been my friend,” he adds. “And you could have taught me magic, you’re better at Penny at explaining things to me, and I’d probably gone off less, you know? I mostly went off because of you, anyway -”

“So it’s on me?” Baz’s voice is ice. He doesn’t disagree. He’s just… ice. “I was a git at eleven and that ruined your life, is that it?”

 _“No_.” he says. “No, you don’t get it. That’s not what I mean. I don’t blame you, I just wish -”

“Then explain it to me in words I’ll understand, Snow, we’ve been here for way too long -”

“I just meant that you could have made me _better._ ”And there it is, torn out of him. His heart is beating like crazy, and he always, somehow, feels it in his wings, when he’s got them. Like the right thing to do is run. “And that it’s probably too late for that now.”

Baz opens his mouth, but no words come out. He seems dead, for one hot minute. Not in a human way, in an undead way. A vampire way. 

“Plus, I liked you.” he adds, voice quiet. “I would have liked to have you around.”

“I’m around right now.” Baz’s voice is tight in a way tells Simon that it’s one of those fights. That if he’d have his magic, he’d have gone off. And someone would be bleeding. And someone would be screaming. And he would be so mad, he’d feel so incredibly awful, and Baz wouldn’t even be there for him. “Or is it too late for -”

Simon shakes his head. He’s not like Baz. All of his movements are jerky. When present, his wings and tail move with him. Things break around him. He bumps into walls. He’s better, when he’s in the air. But _people_ live on the ground. 

“Simon. You don’t need me to make you _better._ ”

A list of things Simons needs to do to be better - that list is an item on the wrong/stupid questions list. It hardly matters. 

Simon shrugs. He broke a window, once, with his wings. Just shrugging. 

This isn’t like the woods. Baz, surrounded by fire (a witch, a homosexual, a vampire - burning at the stake), surrounded by Simon, surrounded by trees. Baz reaches out to take Simon’s hand, for a start. Simon pulls his own hand away. Simon is going to be left alone in the woods. Without magic and with the wings of a demon. This - him - will end in flames.

Something twists in Baz’s face, then. He wonders whether he’s broken Baz. His resolve, that is, to be tormented instead of angry, to swallow instead of sneer. Good. “You know, for someone who wishes I spent my whole short unlife by his side, you were sure excited to leave in the Vampire Academy.”

“I wasn’t excited,” he insists. “I was just -”

“Oh, you were.” Baz’s voice is ice, and his eyes are ice, and Simon figures that now that he’s broken Baz - that Baz is going to hurt him. “You were all ready to free me into the wild like you’re Ash Ketchum and I’m one of your Pokemon.” He tilts his head to the side. His hair falls over his eyes, and Simon wishes he could touch it, but he supposes that he can’t - fair play, right? Or not. Not with them. Not historically. 

“What are you even talking about? I just thought you might be happier there!” he waves with both hands, not sure at what. “You know, with the gay suits. And other cool vampires. And the blood-drinking.”

“I don’t drink human blood -”

“I know that! I do, I know that.” He bites at his lower lip. He feels like his bleeding. He’s been feeling like that for a while. Maybe that’s why he can’t get any closer. “I guess I wasn’t thinking.” 

Baz opens his mouth to answer, but Simon cuts him off. 

“Like - I’m the one who should be left, I guess. With the Normals. Was left with Normals. Every summer. So maybe that was the merciful thing to do.” 

“No, no, I’m pretty sure that’s just the Mage’s abysmal guardianship skills, Snow. Come off it.” He shakes his head. “We’ve literally just picked up a stalker who was cursed by a demon for being too nosy, and you’re worried about _your_ place in _our_ world?” He runs a hand through his hair. “We had to save Agatha because she left her wand at home and run away to America - almost getting us all killed, surely you have more rights to be here than she does, at least.” 

Simon closes his eyes. In his head, they’re in their old room. Simon’s clothes are on the floor. Baz’s notebooks are on the table. The window is open. The window is closed. They’re both yelling. He’s not sure about what. There is magic going through him, like waves, sparks at the tips of his fingers. He’s warm. He’s dizzy. He opens his eyes. Baz never did sober him up.

‘You’re a vampire and a mage,” he says eventually. His voice is soft. “You’re going to live forever.”

Baz shakes his head. “No.”

“Yes.”

“I said no. I get to decide, you won’t even be there to get me out.” He’s thinking about Baz living for nineteen years. He thinks about Baz going on living, and living, without him. About growing old and losing his looks and maybe his hair and eventually his teeth, and Baz going on, without him. He thinks about losing his magic. He doesn’t want to think anymore. 

“Don’t talk like that,” he orders automatically. That was why Angel left Buffy, wasn’t it? One of the times. Because they couldn’t grow old together. 

“I’ll talk how I want to, Snow, you think you know so much _better_ ,” he sneers. Then he adds, “I told you exactly what I want and you -” 

“I’m what?” Simon’s heart his hammering in his chest. Nobody’s told him what he is in a while, since it wasn’t anything good. 

“You can’t do _anything_ ,” Baz’s hands are clenched into fists. Not like he’s going to attack. More like… he’s digging his nails into his skin. He’s crawling into himself. He’s lashing inwards. “Seems like the at least you can grant me the same courtesy and not _dump_ me on a plane leaving from the worst country in the entire world after I watched you fall dead from the sky -” he pauses; inhales; his hands are shaking. “I mean we’re probably fugitives for Crowley’s sake!” 

Simon considers this. There is a tight feeling in his chest, like a void, cold - like his chest is haunted. His wings ache, phantom pains. It occurs to him you’re not actually supposed to dismantle decent-sized organs from your body, maybe, but they’re not even really his, and he _fell_ (“Fell in love, did you?”). “Would it make you feel better? If I didn’t have the wings?”

Baz just stares at him. Like He can’t even begin to understand him. Like he can’t even believe this conversation is happening. “Crowley, Snow, I don’t care,” he snaps, raising his chin. Something hardens in his gaze. “I just wish you’d leave the house.” 

This is good, because that’s what he is, what he’s been, and Baz can see that, Baz is saying that. “I might not.” He confesses. 

Baz takes a deep breath, like even if he really was dead, he’d need some ammunition for to survive this.“That’s fine.”

“I’ll get rid of them.” Simon says. “The wings. The tail.” The magic, and his looks, and his hair and his teeth. Years will roll off of him. 

“Okay.” Baz shrugs.

“That’s it?”

“Snow, I don’t care. Why are we talking about this?”

Why are they talking about this? Because he’s wanted someone to tell him off for a while now, and it means the most coming from Baz. Because there is something dark and ugly clawing at Simon’s chest, hacking at his lungs, climbing up his throat, and he can’t stop, and he wants to stop, so he’s going to crush, probably.“You must care.”

Baz eyes him, up and down, assessing, tired. Like he still approves of the haircut. “I think that if you’re about to fight alongside us at Watford you’ll probably require them, yes.” 

He doesn’t get. “That not what I mean, Baz.” He shakes his head. He squares his jaw. He starts talking - “Look, when someone shows you their true face -”

Baz is the one to cut him off, this time. “Oh, come off it, my true face has fangs.”

There is this scene, in Buffy, that Agatha had always enjoyed too much, where Angel cowers away from Buffy because his vampire face is showing. “You shouldn’t have to see me like that,” he tells her, and he lowers his head, and he’s ashamed. She raises her hand to his face, all disfigured and fanged, and she leans closer to him, and she says, I didn’t even notice. Then she kisses him, sharp teeth and all. Simon has been thinking about that. About doing something like that, for Baz. He’s pretty sure he’ll cut something - his tongue or his lip or his gums, and Baz did mention that they were toxic - the fangs, but he’s been thinking anyway, and - 

“I wasn’t dumping you.” he says quietly. “That’s not what I was doing.” 

Baz inhales sharply. “I know you weren’t,” he snaps, eventually, and his shoulders are a little less tense, and his hands are still shaking. “You’re not that much of an idiot.” A pause. Another deep breath. “What are you doing, then?” 

“I’m not sure,” he tries. Use your words, Simon. A voice in his head. Use your words. “I’m not sure what you want from me, the lot of you. But it’s not just my magic that’s gone, and like I was a person and now I’m not,” there is something burning in his throat. He thinks about Baz, pulling at Simon’s cross with his fingers. “Or I’m less of one.” Baz, snapping it off of him, reaching for him with cold hands, “Everything feels like past tense.” Like, he can say I loved you, but not I love you. The present was uprooted from him, and the future seems bleak. In his head, he’s walking around Watford, guided by the sight of Baz turning a corner, marching down the stairs, running across the football field. This, he’s still got. It’s just a memory, but he’s got it. 

“I’m not past tense.”

“No, I am, _that’s what I’m saying_. And I don’t understand why you’d let me…” Baz, running his finger through Simon’s curls, across Simon’s back, kissing across his jaw. There’s a smell of smoke, all around them. Past tense. “I’m afraid that you’re still waiting for this to end in flames,” he says. 

Baz raises his eyebrows. “And that you’ll disappoint?” 

Simon snorts, “I can start a fire.” 

“I would prefer it, I think. Than having nothing.” 

“That’s not good.”

“Oh, it’s not?” Baz tilts his head to the side, hair moving with him. That’s a very fifteen-year-old-Baz deduction, I expect you’ll move forward.”

What a git. 

“I’m not starting any fires.” He clarifies. He’s not a Mage. He’s not a Dragon. He’s not even a smoker. 

Baz does not seem deterred. “I usually am. But, you know.”

“Pyro,” he’s actually smiling, sort of. Baz was convinced that they were starcrossed (that he was starcrossed, alone and unloved) for so long, and Simon just didn’t see it. He’s seeing it now, for sure, and that’s on him - the stars, their movement - but this feels familiar in a way that nothing is anymore. He doesn’t recognize his own hands, or his own scent. The wings are heavy on his back, and sometimes he would wake up coughing, feeling like his chest has caved in, realizing he hasn’t been breathing properly for a while - his mouth and stomach crushed against the mattress. But this feels like it used to be, before all that. 

Then Baz’s eyes go wide. 

Simon hears them first. It makes sense - they don’t grow out of him anymore, they’re there, and then they’re not, and then they are. But there is a loud bang, then, and a sound of a glass shattering (the mirror? why didn’t Baz magic the mirror away? The two of them in such a small space, surely he knows that everything is collateral. Forests; Cross necklaces; Agatha; Baz’s nose. And definitely furniture. Definitely). 

There is a sharp pain - in his left wing, where it crushed unto the mirror, in his tail, where it crashed against the sink, and is it longer? Are his wings bigger? Surely they are not, but he wasn’t expecting them, wasn’t ready for the extra weight, he’s pulled backward, and he stumbles, reaching out to hold onto the sink with his hands -

He hears that before he feels it, too - Baz’s sharp intake of breath, his voice, hissing Simon’s name, and Simon knows that voice, so that’s when he feels it, the pain in his the palm of his hand, blood making his way all the way down his wrist, sipping into the sleeve of his shirt, and he -

“Simon. Get out of here.” Baz tells him, voice breathless and strange, Simon knows that voice -

-Can’t get out of here. He can’t get back into the plane with wings and a tail, living a hungry vampire in a bathroom stall with nothing to eat but Simon’s own bloodstains on and around the tap. “I can’t, Baz.” he says, a little desperately. “I can’t leave.” 

He listens while Baz lets out a string of creative, slightly unhinged curses, and finally turns to look at Baz - through the pain coursing through his palm, through the mess of his hair, trough the mess of his wings. 

Baz’s fangs are nothing to laugh about. Neither is the rest of him. His skin is paler than ever, Snowwhite pale, “ _whiter shade of pale_ ” pale, and he’s not looking at Simon, and he’s not shaking anymore, either. He’s a statue, he’s DOA, he’s a pillar of salt -

“Baz…” Simon starts. There are politics to hunger. There are politics to self-destruction, and hatred, and pain. First, you isolate yourself. You have to be alone. Simon remembers a forest, and horrible, all-consuming heat, and Baz screaming at him to leave. Baz burying himself in flames. Baz is ignoring him. He’s closing his eyes. Simon takes one ill-advised step closer. His tail snakes around his legs, to rest next to Baz’s, to tap Baz on the knee. Baz recoils like he’s been burnt. Like he’s a vampire, and Simon had set him on fire. 

“Fuck, Snow, you complete and utter idiot, get away from me -” He remembers Baz, starved enough to tear a goddamn tree from the ground.

Simon can’t. Simon knows, he can feel it, the void in Baz’s stomach, the emptiness in his chest, the knowledge that there is a solution to this hunger and he can’t have it, and he shouldn’t have it, and he doesn’t deserve to have it -

“Fuck.” Baz says. “Fuck, put them back where they come from. You’re not an animal.” He’s speaking, is the thing. Like, to another human being, like - to the universe, like it’s a spell. Which is why Simon’s heart stops in his chest, for a second (and then another, and then - well, its never as good as it used be, it’s not in working order anymore). 

“Don’t say that to me!” Simon calls out. Because Baz was casting a spell. Because the spell wasn’t working. Because Simon is not an animal, but he’s not anything civilized, either. 

Baz turns to him once more, like Simon is the stupidest thing in the entire world, like he doesn’t deserve to be dealing with any of this, and maybe Simon should have left, but he can’t he’s got a tail and he can’t - “I wasn’t speaking to you, you Numpty, of course you can’t do anything about your problem. Shit.” He takes a deep breath. “It’s not working, shit. _Will you stop bleeding already_?” 

The last one startles Simon out of his trance, and he turns to the sink, washes his hand under tepid water, watches his blood circling down the drain. He then reaches for a few (like, twenty-five) paper towels, wrapping them around his palm to the best of his ability. “You can’t control it either, though, right?” he offers quietly. “No use beating yourself up over it.” 

“Of course I can,” Baz snaps as if he spent the last eight years eating his meals in private for fun. “Lamb showed me how,” he explains.

This is how the plane is going to crush, probably, Simon and Baz, together in a bathroom stall, talking about Lamb, of all people, Simon standing there, useless, while Baz is trying not to eat him. “Great.” Simon blurts out. 

“Oh don’t you start.” 

The thing is, Simon’s heart is broken. The thing is, he knows it wasn’t Baz doing the breaking. The thing is, Simon is what he is, and he looks the way that he does, and he’s useless the way that he is, the way that in a way he always was, and sometimes Baz leaving him seems so inevitable, it’s as if it’d already happened. 

“No, I - I mean it.” Baz gives him an incredulous look, so Simon continues. “You can eat with us now, right? I mean, you could have before, if you ask me, but -”

“But I wasn’t asking,” Baz hisses. 

“Right,” Simon concedes. “Plus we could eat outside!” He’s near yelling, but he doesn’t care much. Baz can deal with it. 

“What?” Baz is staring at him. ‘ _Being loud won’t make your magic work better, Snow_.’ “You want us to dine out?”

Simon blinks at him. “I guess?” 

Baz’s look is inquisitive, like he’s trying to understand just what Simon’s deal is. “Sure,” he says, voice vague around his fangs. “It’s a date.” A pause. A deep breath. 

“You could heal me,” Simon offers. “Heal me and it won’t be a problem. My hand.”

“No, I can’t.” 

“Sure you can. You barely even sound hungry anymore,” Simon tells him, though he’s not sure that’s true. He then offers his hand, wet paper towels and all, in a display that must be somewhat disgusting, but Simon is too tired to care. He doesn’t want them in this room, for the entire flight, until Penny thinks to look for them. Not touching each other. Not looking at each other. Unable to leave. “Come on, Baz. You said you said you could do this.”

“That’s not what I said.” Baz sneers. 

Simon sighs, before dropping his hand and removing the towels, checking on the wound. He used to heal a bit faster than most people, before. Somehow, that still seems to be the case. He throws the paper in the bin, before washing his hand once again, ignoring the pain and trying to avoid the still scattered glass. “You think that you could repair the mirror, at least?” he says.

Baz doesn’t answer. 

“Baz?”

“Crowley, just give me your hand, Snow.” He snaps, reaching out to grab Simon’s hand, before stopping at once, his arm frozen between the two of them. 

Simon sighs. He closes his eyes, and he opens them, and then he reaches forward and deposits his palm on top of Baz’s hand. 

Baz swallows. “If the fangs ruin my pronunciation and everything goes wrong that’s on you.” 

“My entire existence is spells gone wrong, Baz. Get on with it.” 

Baz casts “ _get better soon_ ”, and “ _laughter is the best medicine_ ”, and “ _good as new_ ”, and Simon’s blood is gone, and so does the wound, and the mirror is all fixed. Baz is panting, still holding on to his wand, looking around like he can’t fucking believe it. That’s most of what he looks like, around Simon, that, and exasperated, and like he’s not fucking surprised. 

“Thank you,” Simon tells him. 

“Don’t ever mention it,” Baz tells him, but that’s his standard response, so that’s fine. 

“Do you think that I could kiss you?” Simon asks, and Baz startles. “With the fangs?” 

“Are you an idiot? You can’t ever do that.”

Simon nods. “I imagined, just thought I’d ask.”

“Why would you even want that?”

Simon shrugs. Baz kissed Simon after learning he was the Humdrum, it seems fitting. It seems fair. Plus, it’s just teeth, really. 

Simon’s hand is still resting on Baz’s, and Baz is staring at it, as if trying to make sure that… well, who knows. Baz is always protecting himself from something, always stopping himself from doing something. Penny once told him that Baz has made a religion out of not having Simon. That he was an ascetic, at heart. That he doesn’t really know what to do with himself now (Simon didn’t know what to say. He asked her what ascetic meant, mostly). “It would have been nice to be… your friend, in Watford,” he admits suddenly. “I would have been,” he swallows. Baz always seems as if he’s feelings are hurting him. “Happier, I suppose.” 

Simon is smiling at him, now. It’s such a nice thing to say. Surely it’s worth Baz despising himself for exposing his thoughts and emotions. 

“I would have exposed the Mage right away, of course. That would have saved a lot of misery for the lot of us. And I would be near you, when you went off. I suppose I could have stopped that too, once we’ve figured out that you can channel your magic through me. Not as much deadspots, for sure” He seems deep in thought, like he’s walking a path he’s never let himself walk before, in his mind. Simon knows the feeling. “I would have helped you with your spells, of course, so I assume you’d be passable.” Baz takes a deep breath. “And Since I’m so cool and handsome and helpful and wise, not to mention a hero, you would fall deeply in love with right away.”

“I did fell in -”

“Don’t interrupt me,” he snaps. “I would, eventually, agree to go out with you,” he says, voice tilting. “We’d be the envy of all unliving and dead things, the power couple of the school -”

“You’d get kidnapped like, three times a year,” Simon offers.

“Oh, as if.” he sniffs. “And if I would you’ll save me. It would be romantic.”

Simon’s smile is rueful. “I’m told the novelty wears off.”

“Wellbelove doesn’t have the stamina, she doesn’t count.” Baz dismisses him. “Together, we would have beaten the Humdrum before it even started wearing your ridiculous face, and I would have destroyed every creature in the world trying to hurt you, and I wouldn’t have left your side, and I’d find a way for you to be stuck in this world with me forever, and you’d never even think about breaking it off with me to _spare_ me,” a pause. “Or, I mean, at all.” He’s a little out of breath, by the end. 

Simon can’t seem to form words. He squeezes Baz’s hand. He blinks around the wetness in his eyes. “I might not even have had to give up all the magick I -” he stops. “I could have kept the part that was mine.” There are tears streaming down his cheeks. Just tears, though. None of them turns into a monster because of tears. It’s fine. 

Baz squeezes back, his fingers cold around Simon’s fingers. “Yeah,” he says. “Probably.” 

He doesn’t look like he’s indulging Simon. That is, that he thinks that Simon is crazy. And a Normal. And an idiot. There is a long silence, and neither of them speaks, and neither of them moves, and Simon isn’t sure what they’re doing here, anymore, except that he doesn’t want to take Baz out into the real world, since it’s such a horrible, twisted place, and that Baz still has to magick his wings and tail away. Simon opens his mouth to remind him, when Baz says: “I guess we should head back… Before your sidekicks of future past come barging in here, looking for you.”

Simon blinks at him. “For us.” 

Baz ignores him. “We all know who gets who in the di -” then he stops. 

Simon doesn’t know what to tell him. He settles on: “Nah.”

Baz rolls his eyes so hard it must be painful, before pulling out his wand, and magicks Simon’s dragon parts away. He feels too light, without them. Like he’s cheating at life. Like he’s going to float away, which is insane, since _he has no wings_. 

“Thank you,” he says. He squeezes Baz’s hand again. It’s the easiest way to communicate, probably. 

“Let’s get back.”

“Yeah, um. Look.” He starts.

So Baz turns hostile immediately. “Oh, what now?”

“I just -”

“What horrible thing could we have possibly left out from this horrible conversation that must be disclosed right now. While I’m still feeling as if someone staked me -”

“Oh, shut up.” Simon says, and pull at Baz’s hand, and pulls Baz down for a kiss, and then maybe he pulls at his hair - just a little. Baz shuts up. 

Reality is disorienting. Simon feels off-balanced, when they leave the stall. He trips, and he grabs at Baz’s shoulder, and Baz rolls his eyes, and then they make their way back to their seats.

Their friends are unimpressed. “You know, if you just wanted to join the mile-high club, I’m pretty sure fifteen minutes would have done it.”

Baz ignores her.

Simon sputters. 

“We were going for a premium membership,” Baz says, smirking. 

Simon is still sputtering. 

“You look like you’ve been crying,” Shepard tells - well, both of them, really. 

“You look like you’ve been cursed by a demon,” Baz shoots back. “You don’t see me calling you out.”

Penny rolls her eyes at both of them, before returning to her book. Agatha is asleep. 

Shepard does not return to his phone. “So did you work things out?” he asks, voice gentle. It appears that he does care, and Simon is tempted to tell him, except that he’s not sure, and he doesn’t want to assume anything regarding Baz, knows better than to assume anything about himself, and so -

“Shepard, I like you, I really do.”

Shepard’s eyebrows rise. “Really?”

Should Simon warn him? Shake his head no?

“But if details about my relationship appear in your blog I swear to whatever it is out there that I will feed you to the Merwolves at Watford.

“There are Merwolves at Watford?” Shepard asks. He seems excited. Then he adds, “I don’t have a blog. Just an Instagram account.” 

Baz stares him down for a moment, then two, before seemingly coming to a decision that he can’t - or won’t - deal with this. It’s only Simon’s nonsense, that Baz makes time for. Simon is the only person in Baz’s life allowed to act like a moron, and even that is up to a point. It was satisfying, even at the age of eleven, to watch Baz berates and mocks and jeers at someone else. At the age of eighteen, Simon almost had a stroke when Baz took his side in an argument about Torchwood, season four. 

Shepard has gone back to his flight activity - pretending he’s watching a film while staring at Penny (Simon feels that he has enough authority in the staring department to tell). Simon has gone back to his life activity, blatantly and intensely staring at Baz. 

“Take a picture,” Baz tells him.

“I have pictures,” Simon replies. 

Baz is smiling when he finally looks back, and Simon realizes that he never did notice, when Baz finally managed to retract his fangs. That he didn’t really care. 

“Snow,” Baz says.

“Simon,” Simon corrects. 

Baz rolls his eyes, but his heart isn’t in it. “Keep the wings, Snow.”

Simon blinks at him. “What?” His hand goes slack between Baz’s fingers. 

Baz is staring right at him, his eyes sharp, his voice sharper. “I lied, I do care.” He looks determined, but also like he wants to off himself, just a little bit. “You should keep the wings.” 

Simon, who’s lived under the impression his wings and tail bother most people around him, especially those who’re interested in having him - like, on his back, and probably without his tail being in the way, isn’t really sure where this is going, and why. “Why?”

Baz definitely seems like he wants to stab something. “You like flying.” He explains - slowly, though not like Simon is thick. Just… slowly, “And you’re good at it, better then you are at walking, for sure.” He adds, and that’s fine. Simon is not especially good at walking. “Plus you saved me, with them. And I’m selfish like that.” Baz is selfish, is the thing. But Simon doesn’t think he’s selfish like _that_. “Keep them. Or don’t, I don’t care.” 

“You just told me you do care.” Baz cares so much he’s about to go off. He’s about to Hulk out. 

“I’m sure you’re just hearing things.” 

There is a voice, inside of him, like a spell (like, “Every time a child says, 'I don't believe in fairies,' there is a fairy somewhere that falls down dead.") telling him that this is nonsense. The wings were never anything brilliant, out of everything that he’s done, he got to keep the stupidest thing, the one thing neither Penny nor Baz ever got. And they think that he should get rid of them, and they want him to move on so that they won’t have to spend so much magick on it, anymore, and they want him to be _normal_ , because, he is one. Capital N. 

But then he thinks, what if the plane is going to crash. What if the tin can who’s currently their entire world and barely contains enough homogenous speech for spells, crumbles, and breaks and fall apart, and then he thinks, that he’s got wings, sort of. He can have wings, at a moment’s notice. And he’s got Baz, clutched between his fingers, so he can’t fall. 

“What about the tail?” Simon asks. “Should I keep the tail?”

Baz raises one judgemental eyebrow. 

“I mean, they’re kind of a set.” And he thinks, what if Watford is on fire, what if the only home he’s ever had is on fire and he can’t open the gate and he can’t even get in and everything he loves is inside, and Baz is flammable - except that he can fly. Not on _love’s light wing_ , granted, but sort off? He can fly. 

“This seems like an intimate conversation -” Shepard starts -

“Then stop listening to it!” Baz snarls at him. His gaze, when he turns back to Simon, softens. He has that look in his eyes, like he’s trying not to smile, and he’s succeeding, and he’s good at it. Simon gets a whiplash, usually - from the change, but he’s okay at the moment. 

“Can we get me a sword, do you think?” he asks. “At Watford?” 

“What a stupid question,” Baz replies. 

“Good,” Simon tells him, cause he can read between the lines, when swords are the subject. He pulls Baz’s hand into his lap, sinking back into his seat until he can lean into Baz’s shoulder. “I’m ready to fight, then.” 

_You're at a loss_  
_Just because_  
_It wasn't all that you thought it was_  
_You are a fugitive, but you don't know what you're runnin' away from_

_She said, "I want to sleep in the city that never wakes up_  
_And revel in nostalgia."_  
_I know I said he wants to sleep in the city that never wakes up, but_  
_Dorothy was right though_

_Old Yellow Bricks / Arctic Monkeys_

  
  



End file.
